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UNIVERSITY GF i.iagrs 

BY 


- GEORGE A. Dorsey, 
Curator, Department of Anthropology. 


Curcaco, U. S. A. 
December, 1900. — 


FIELD CoLUMBIAN MUSEUM 
PUBLICATION 51. 


ANTHROPOLOGICAL SERIES. Vot. II, Now, 4. 


AN ABORIGINAL QUARTZITE 
QUARRY IN. EASTERN 
WYOMING. 


THE LIBRARY OF THE 


‘FEB 17 1938 


UNIVERSITY GF ILLINOIS 
BY 


GeorGE A. Dorsey, 
Curator, Department of Anthropology. 


Cuicaco, U.S. A. 


December, 1900, 


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v.24 
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CONTENTS. 
PAGE. 
Introduction, - - - : - - : - 235 
= Location and recent history of the quarry, - - - - - 237 
The route tothe quarry, = - - - - . : - 237 
a Quarrying operations by means of excavations, - mea Set ava 6 ae 
Nature of occurrence and character of material quarried, - . 238 


> Character of work done in the pits, as determined by exposed quartzite 
stratum in ravine, - - 3 P : F 


Sr. 
Hammer-stones, - - - - - e : a 240 
Rejects and flakes, - - - - : = ; - 240 
Material found about the tipi circles or shop sites, - - - 241 
Age and occupation, - - - - ? i : <* Sgag 


ILLUSTRATIONS. 


PLATE. 
XXVIII. North wall of ravine with exposed stratum of quartzite. 
XXIX. More detailed view of quartzite stratum, showing colored masses or 
geodic phases. . 
XXX. Section of quartzite stratum with jasper nodules in situ. 
XXXI. General character and contour of pits.’ 

XXXII. More detailed view of pits, showing extent of workings. 
XXXIII. Compact masses of quartzite used as hammer-stones. 
XXXIV. Typical rejects from neighborhood of pits. 

XXXV. Additional rejects from pits. 

XXXVI. Typical flakes from pits. 
XXXVII. Typical rejects and flakes from neighborhood of tipi circles. | 
XXXVIII. Characteristic scrapers from neighborhood of tipi circles. 
XXXIX. Lower milling-stone found within a tipi circle. 


233 


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INTRODUCTORY. 


Stone implements of various forms which have been collected 
from the present Indian tribes of Wyoming and neighboring States 
are rather familiar objects in museum collections. These implements 
comprise the well ‘known maul or hammer used in crushing berries 
and meat, arrow planes, and the simple flakes and rudely chipped 
implements used in the dressing of hides. In addition are a number 
of other stone objects, nearly all of which are used for various 
domestic purposes. Among them are occasionally arrow or spear 
points of flint, but as a rule objects of flint are not encountered 
among these collections. That the Indians of Wyoming used count- 
less numbers of arrow and some spear points of flint there is no 
doubt, but I am not aware that large flint knives or flint agricultural 
implements have ever been collected among or found in use by these 
Indians. Hence the added interest attaching itself to a quarry where 
the rejectage indicates that the manufactured objects sought after 
were large knives, and, above all, agricultural implements. 


235 


AN ABORIGINAL QUARTZITE QUARRY IN 
EASTERN WYOMING. 


LOCATION AND RECENT HISTORY OF THE QUARRY. 


The quarry is situated near the central southern border of Con- 
verse County and within a few miles of Laramie County. Itis about 
half way between the towns of Keeline on the Fremont, Elkhorn 
and Missouri Valley Railroad and Glendo on the Union Pacific, Den- 
ver and Gulf Railroad. It is not, however, accessible from either of 
these stations. . . 

My attention was first directed to the quarry by Mr. E. S. Riggs 
of the Geological department of the Field Columbian Museum. Mr. 
Riggs, while on a paleontological expedition to Wyoming in 1895, 
_ passed over a portion of the quarry and readily recognized its nature. 
Mr. Walter C. Wyman, of Evanston, Illinois, also heard of the 
quarry and in April of this year brought to the Museum a few speci- 
mens which had been collected by Judge Eastman, of Chicago, in 
company with Mr. Sidney Bartlett, of Cheyenne, in 1899. Mr. Bart- 
lett had previously visited the quarry in 1893 and wrote a brief 
account of it, which appeared in the San Francisco Examiner. Messrs. 
Lauk and Stein, two ranchmen living in Whalen Cajfion, heard of the 
quarry in 1882 from some cowboys and for a long time it was known 
as the ‘‘ Mexican mine.” Indeed, so strong was the impression that 
the quarry was an abandoned ‘‘ Mexican mine,” that Lauk and Stein 
decided to investigate the matter, and in 1886 they made some exca- 
vations in the vicinity and in 1891 they hired a man, who worked for 
several weeks; it is, perhaps, needless to say that the results of these 
investigations were not satisfactory to the ranchmen. 


THE ROUTE TO THE QUARRY. 


In May of this year, accompanied by Mr. Stewart Culin, I 
reached the ranch of Lauk and Stein by using the railroad from 
Cheyenne to Guernsey and by driving seven miles north from 

237 


238 FieLp CoLumBiAN MusrtuM-—-ANTHROPOLOGY, VoL. II. 


Guernsey. Nothing could exceed the kindness and generosity of 
Mr. Lauk and of his partner, Mr. Stein. Their ranch is in a most 
picturesque spot of Whalen Cajion, and at a short distance from the 
house are innumerable stone tipi circles, while the ground is strewn 
with fragments of flint of many kinds, of which I shall speak more 
fully later on. 

Equipped with food and bedding, we left the ranch early one 
morning with Mr. Lauk for guide, and by driving north and slightly 
west for about thirty miles we came in the afternoon to the quarry, 
where we spent the night, returning to the ranch late the next day. 
Naturally, in such a short time it was impossible to make a thorough 
examination of the quarry, but the main features were noted and a 
large amount of material was collected, so that it is possible to give 
a fairly accurate account of the conditions under which flint was 
mined by the aborigines before the advent of the white race. 


QUARRYING OPERATIONS BY MEANS OF EXCAVATIONS. 


The quarry is located on a lofty rounded eminence which, how- 
ever, attains its height by a very gradual ascent. From the summit > 
one looks off in almost every direction over a vast expanse of treeless 
sage-brush plain, with no living thing in view except an occasional 
sage-hen or antelope. Here and there over the surface of the emi- 
nence are many pits with a diameter of twenty to fifty feet, and of a 
depth of from ten to thirty feet. The walls and bottoms ofthese pits 
are, of course, covered with flint refuse, which is almost entirely 
unworked. Inthe more open spaces between the pits, and especi- 
ally on the south slope of the eminence, are many stone tipi circles, 
in one group alone over twenty being noted, some of them so perfect 
that it seems as though the tipis had been removed but the day before. 


NATURE OF OCCURRENCE AND CHARACTER OF MATERIAL 
QUARRIED. © 7 


On the east side of the eminence the grade is rather more 
abrupt than on the other sides," and near the base of the hill we 
encounter a deep ravine or wash with vertical walls, thus giving a 
fine exposure of the character of‘rock sought after higher up. Exam- 
ining one of the walls of the wash (see Pl. XXVIII) we find a solid 
stratum, thirty or more feet thick, of flint, or rather of sandstone, 


Dec. 1900. AN ABORIGINAL QUARTZITE QuaRRY—Dorsey. 239 


which had been worked over by silicious waters, thus forming quartz- 
ite. This stratum is of variegated color, passing from yellowish 
brown to violet gray, varied with shades of pink, violet, yellow, pur- 
ple, etc., the whole stratum thus producing a most beautiful and 
remarkable color effect. The upper two or three feet of rock is very 
brittle and does not chip well; indeed, it occurs not as a solid mass, 
but, owing to long weathering, in long thin sheets or irregular blocks. 
Lower down, on close examination, there may be found irregularly 
rounded or elliptical masses which are of a dense and compact 
nature (see Pl. XXIX). These rounded masses are evidently results 
from the solidification of silicious water percolating into cavities, thus 
presenting a geodic phase which is tougher and more coherent than 
the surrounding quartzite rock, and hence better adapted to a 
chipping process. Evidently it was these compact masses which the 
aboriginal workmen were seeking. Also at irregular intervals may 
occasionally be found small nodules of jasper, and chalcedony, and 
agatized masses which were also highly prized as they afforded most 
excellent material for small arrow points, and especially for the small 
scrapers which are found in so great an abundance around the tipi 
circles throughout the entire region. Curiously, in two places (see 
Pl. XXX) were observed jasper nodules projecting from the wall, and 
they had been much battered, and the surrounding quartzite had 
received many blows in the vain attempt of the workmen to dislodge 
them from their position. 

All along the wall of this wash was presented evidence of much 
work. The upper beds of weathered quartzite had been dislocated, 
probably by means of wooden wedges and bars, to a depth of from 
seven to fifteen feet, for a distance of several hundred feet. As a 
result the bottom of the wash, and especially its banks, were covered 
to a depth of several feet with long, thin, irregular masses usually 
averaging a foot in length and from two to four inches in breadth. 
That the proper variety of flint was not easily found until considera- 
ble depth had been reached, and not then except at irregular inter- 
vals, was apparent from the almost‘total absence of rejects, flakes, 
or hammer-stones in the immediate vicinity of the wash. 


CHARACTER OF WORK DONE IN THE PITS, AS DETERMINED 
BY EXPOSED QUARTZITE STRATUM IN RAVINE. 


Although there was no time for other than a superficial exami- 
nation of the pits higher up on the eminence, yet the evidence 


240 FieLp CoLumBian MustuM—ANTHROPOLOGY, VoL. II. 


afforded by the character of the refuse surrounding and partially fill- 
ing them leads me to believe that the object of the numerous excava- 
tions was similar to that of the work done in the wash (see Pl. XXXI). 
After the soil had been penetrated, the workmen encountered the 
upper unworkable rock through which it was necessary to excavate 
to a considerable depth before the denser masses of workable mate- 
rial and the jasper and chalcedony nodules were encountered (see 
Pl. XXXII). On account of the broken character of the upper mass 
of the quartzite bed such excavations were not necessarily difficult 
operations. Furthermore, it is possible to believe that this work 
could be carried on with tools similar to those which would be found 
efficacious in working the exposed stratum down in the valley. 


HAMMER-STONES. 


We may now examine some of the products of the quarry. Hav- 
ing very recently, previous to my visit in Wyoming, examined with 
some care the rich and instructive flint quarry at Mill Creek, Illinois, 
I was immediately impressed with the almost total absence of tools. 
Of digging or quarrying implements nota single specimen was found, 
and a diligent search of many hours yielded only some twenty ham- 
mer-stones, and those of the simplest nature. Indeed, they were 
nothing more nor less than rough, irregular, core-like masses of 
quartzite which, on account of structural characteristics, were not suit- 
able for the manufacture of implements (see Pl. XXXIII). There is 
nothing particular in their shape, except for the fact that they are of 
a size which could easily be grasped in the hand, to show that they 
were hammer-stones. It is only from the presence on one or more 
sides of a great amount of abrasion, which could come only from long 
usage in breaking up and blocking out large masses of hard rock, that 
their true character can be made out. 


REJECTS AND FLAKES. 


/ 


In examining the rejectage about the pits one suffers from the 
same condition which confronts one at the great chert quarry of 
Peoria, Indian Tertitory, namely—the utter lack of knowledge of the 
finished product. It does not take more than a superficial examina- 
tion, however, to demonstrate that the material most desired was that 
which could be worked up either into a long and rather broad lance- 


~ 
Dec. 1900. AN ABORIGINAL QUARYTZITE QuaRRY—Dorsey. 241 


head or into a still larger leaf-shaped implement, which, perhaps, was 
destined for agricultural purposes. Nothing whatsoever was found 
in a finished condition and, indeed, specimens in the ‘turtle back” 
stagé were not numerous. The illustrations (Pls. XXXIV and 
XXXV) present some of the more characteristic forms of the 
rejectage, along with a few of the most highly differentiated and com- 
pleted rejects. 

The pits are further characterized by the almost total absence of 
small flakes, thus showing, as do the rejects, that only the roughest 
sort of work was attempted in the immediate neighborhood of the 
pits. Of large flakes, however, many interesting specimens were 
collected, some of the best examples being shown on Pl. XXXVI. 
The smallest flake found measured 2% inches in length, the largest 
12 inches. 


MATERIAL FOUND ABOUT THE TIPI GIRCLES OR SHOP SITES. 


As the refuse about the pits is characterized by the largeness of 
the rejects and chips, so the exact reverse is true of the material 
which is found strewn about the ground near the stone tipi circles. 
No work whatever seems to have been done on the small jasper and 
chalcedony nodules about the pits, this being reserved for the shop 
at the tipi. As a consequence a great deal of refuse is here found in 
small rejects, usually of the leaf-shape pattern, small flakes and small 
hammer-stones made from jasper or irregularly shaped unworkable 
nodules. No single specimen of a finished arrowhead was encoun- 
tered, nor was any reject discovered from which one could safely pre- 
dict its destined final shape. The fragmentary and unsatisfactory 
condition of this shop site refuse may readily be seen in Pl. XXXVII, 
where are reproduced some characteristic hammer-stones, rejects and 
flakes. . 

Worthy of notice, not so much from their connection with the 
quarrying and chipping operations as from their great abundance, are 
the small jasper and chalcedony scrapers, some of the better 
examples of which are to be found on Pl. XXXVIII. These were 
found in surprising quantities, not only about the tipi circles near the 
quarry but also in the vicinity of the circles on Lauk and Stein’s ranch, 
thirty miles away, and at the innumerable circles encountered on the 
road between the ranch and the quarry, all of which show evidence 
of having been shop sites. Jt is remarkable, however, that at none 
of the shop sites between the ranch and the quarry did I find any 


242 FieLp CoLumBian Mus—EuM—ANTHROPOLOGY, VoL, II. 


evidence of the work being done on the large roughed-out leaf-shaped 
implements which prevail right at the quarry pits. 

Among the refuse at the quarry tipi circles were found five speci- 
mens which possess some interest. Two were of jasper and had evi- 
dently served as drills, one being long and slender and chipped on 
both sides, the other being a flake which was notched at one end for 
the purpose of hafting. The other three were fragments of stone 
hammers such as are commonly used to-day by the Shoshoni and 
Arapahoe women of western Wyoming for pounding berries, meat, etc. 
Curiously, the material of these three fragments was different in each 
specimen, one being of quartz, another of granite, while the third 
was of diorite. 

There remains to be mentioned a flat stone metate found near 
one of the tipi circles (see Pl. XXXIX). This is of quartzite and 
measures fourteen inches in length by nine inches in breadth, while 
it does not exceed one inch in its thickest part. This was probably 
used as the lower milling-stone for grinding corn. 


AGE AND OCCUPATION. 


In a dry and generally arid region; where the vegetation is scant, 
it is not to be expected that the quarry with its pits and refuse heaps 
would be covered to any great extent with vegetable mould, however 
great their antiquity. As a matter of fact, even such evidence of age 
as might be expected from this source is almost entirely absent. The 
exposed material seems as fresh and bright as though operations had 
ceased but yesterday. At one place on the bank near the ravine I 
found a great flat slab which evidently served as a seat for some 
workman. Seating myself on it, I could readily make out the grooves 
in front of the seat where had rested the legs and feet, while on the 
right were two hammer-stones of different sizes, and all about were 
chips, refuse, and many rejected and partially roughed-out imple- 
ments. The whole place suggests suspended operations and a 
temporary abandonment. What tribe or tribes worked the quarry is, 
of course, not possible now to determine, but that mining was carried 
on here extensively and through a considerable period of time there 
is no doubt. Furthermore, the great number and wide extent of the 
tipi circles leads to the belief that permanent encampments were 
made right at and in the vicinity of the quarry. It seems probable 
that the work was done by some of the Plains Indians and within a 
comparatively recent period, but before the advent of the white race 


Dec. 1900. AN ABORIGINAL QUARTZITE QuaRRY—DorsEy. 243 


in this region. There is also reason to believe that the people who 
worked here practiced agriculture to a very considerable extent, for 
it is difficult to form any other conclusion regarding the greater num- 
ber of rejects found about the quarry than that they were intended 
for agricultural implements. 

“That there is a rich field for archeological exploration in the 
vicinity of this quarry, and that many problems still unsolved but 
well worthy of solution remain in regard to the quarry itself, I am 
fully aware, and to a thorough investigation of the region I expect to 
devote some time during the coming summer. 


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LIBRARY 
OF THE 


UNIVERSITY of ILLINOIS. 


FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. XXVIII. 


WALL OF RAVINE WiTH ExPOSED STRATUM OF QUARTZITE. 


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FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. XXIX. 


DETAILED VIEW OF QUARTZITE STRATUM, SHOWING COLORED MASSES OR GEODIC PHASES, 


FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. XxX. 


UPPER QUARTZITE STRATUM SHOWING JASPER NODULES. 


LIBRARY 
OF THE 


UNIVERSITY of ILLINOIS, 


FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. XXXI. 


RAE 


GENERAL CHARACTER AND CONTOUR OF Pits. 


LIBRARY 
OF THE 


UNIVERSITY of ILLINOIS. 


FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. 


ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. XXXil. 


DETAILED ViEW OF PITS, SHOWING EXTENT OF WORKINGS. 


LIBRARY 
QF THE 


. UNIVERSITY of LLINOIS, ‘ 


FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. Xxxili. 


COMPACT QUARTZITE MASSES USED AS HAMMER-STONES. 


ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. XXXIV. 


FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. 


TYPICAL REJECTS FROM NEIGHBORHOOD OF PITS, 


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FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. XXXV. 


TYPICAL REJECTS FROM NEIGHBORHOOD OF PITS. 


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FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. XXXVI, 


TYPICAL FLAKES FROM Pits. 


FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. XXXVII, 


TYPICAL REJECTS AND FLAKES FROM NEIGHBORHOOD OF TiPi CIRCLES, 


LIBRARY 
OF THE 


UNIVERSITY of ILLINOIS. 


FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. XXXVIII. 


CHARACTERISTIC SCRAPERS FROM NEIGHBORHOOD OF TIP! CIRCLES. 


FIELD COLUMBIAN MUSEUM. ANTHROPOLOGY, PL. XXXIX. 


LOWER MILLING STONE FOUND WITHIN A TIP: CIRCLE, 


LIBRARY 
OF THE 


UNIVERSITY of ILLINOIS, 


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